Heroes

Personal heroes will fail and usually, they’ll fail profoundly. At least I have heard so and it feels mostly true because it’s so refreshing when a personal hero doesn’t. Now, I have to say, I am often annoyed by celebrity opinions. In fact, some of the least informed people on earth are musicians and actors. Any election season will tell you that.

I hesitate to call any celebrity a hero and often have disdain for those who do.

With that said, I have loved and admired a rock band since I was in grade 8. Throughout high school, I constantly scoured magazines and newspapers for articles about them. I pored over interviews and found myself emulating them and reading the books they read. I found myself agreeing with their many opinions or considering their alternate view when I didn’t. I have tracked with them as an adult and even dragged my wife to a concert.

One concert.

The members of the band and I wouldn’t agree on everything, but as I watched an interview on CBC’s “The Hour” with George Stroumboulopoulos I was struck by the consistent normality of this band. I found them to still be unpretentious, charming and unapologetically normal. They were the kind of people that have never embarrassed me and I have never been terribly ashamed of their thoughts. I can’t imagine tracking with other bands whose members still talk of their glory days like Uncle Rico’s character did in Napoleon Dynamite.

That is why it is still so refreshing to see and hear them discussing their work and personal lives.

All these years later, I still consider these strangers my friends.
Thanks, guys.